—Which might be freely rendered thus:—

"...I am dimpled, young, Round-limbed, and strong, With sapota-skin That is good to see: All glossy-smooth Is this skin of mine; And the gravest men Like to look at me!"]

26 (return)
[ It was I who washed and ironed and mended;—at nine o'clock at night thou didst put me out-of-doors, with my child in my arms,—the rain was falling,—with my poor straw mattress upon my head!... Doudoux! thou dost abandon me!... I have none to care for me.]

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[ Also called La Barre de 'Isle,—a long high mountain-wall interlinking the northern and southern system of ranges,—and only two metres broad at the summit. The "Roches-Carrées", display a geological formation unlike anything discovered in the rest of the Antillesian system, excepting in Grenada,—columnar or prismatic basalts.... In the plains of Marin curious petrifactions exist;—I saw a honey-comb so perfect that the eye alone could scarcely divine the transformation.]

28 (return)
[ Thibault de Chanvallon, writing of Martinique in 1751, declared:—"All possible hinderances to study are encountered here (tout s'oppose à l'etude): if the Americans [creoles] do not devote themselves to research, the fact must not be attributed solely to indifference or indolence. On the one hand, the overpowering and continual heat,—the perpetual succession of mornes and acclivities,—the difficulty of entering forests rendered almost inaccessible by the lianas interwoven across all openings, and the prickly plants which oppose a barrier to the naturalist,—the continual anxiety and fear inspired by serpents also;—on the othelr hand, the disheartening necessity of having to work alone, and the discouragement of being unable to communicate one's ideas or discoveries to persons having similar tastes. And finally, it must be remembered that these discouragements and dangers are never mitigated by the least hope of personal consideration, or by the pleasure of emulation,—since such study is necessarily unaccompanied either by the one or the other in a country where nobody undertakes it."—(Voyage à la Martinique.)...The conditions have scarcely changed since De Chanvallon's day, despite the creation of Government roads, and the thinning of the high woods.]

29 (return)
[ Humboldt believed the height to be not less than 800 toises (1 toise=6 ft. 4.73 inches), or about 5115 feet.]

30 (return)
[ There used to be a strange popular belief that however heavily veiled by clouds the mountain might be prior to an earthquake, these would always vanish with the first shock. But Thibault de Chanvallon took pains to examine into the truth of this alleged phenomenon; and found that during a number of earthquake shocks the clouds remained over the crater precisely as usual.... There was more foundation, however, for another popular belief, which still exists,—that the absolute purity of the atmosphere about Pelée, and the perfect exposure of its summit for any considerable time, might be regarded as an omen of hurricane.]

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[ "De la piqure du serpent de la Martinique," par Auguste Charriez, Medecin de la Marine. Paris: Moquet, 1875]

32 (return)
[ M. Francard Bayardelle, overseer of the Prèsbourg plantation at Grande Anse, tells me that the most successful treatment of snake bite consists in severe local cupping and bleeding; the immediate application of twenty to thirty leeches (when these can be obtained), and the administration of alkali as an internal medicine. He has saved several lives by these methods.

The negro panseur method is much more elaborate and, to some extent, mysterious. He cups and bleeds, using a small couï, or half-calabash, in lieu of a grass; and then applies cataplasms of herbs,—orange-leaves, cinnamon-leaves, clove-leaves, chardon-béni, charpentier, perhaps twenty other things, all mingled together;—this poulticing being continued every day for a month. Meantime the patient is given all sorts of absurd things to drink, in tafia and sour-orange juice—such as old clay pipes ground to powder, or the head of the fer-de-lance itself, roasted dry and pounded.... The plantation negro has no faith in any other system of cure but that of the panseur;—he refuses to let the physician try to save him, and will scarcely submit to be treated even by an experienced white over-seer.]

33 (return)
[ The sheet-lightnings which play during the nights of July and August are termed in creole Zéclai-titiri, or "titiri-lightnings";—it is believed these give notice that the titiri have begun to swarn in the rivers. Among the colored population there exists an idea of some queer relation between the lightning and the birth of the little fish,—it is commonly said, "Zéclai-a ka fai yo écloré" (the lightning hatches them).]

34 (return)
[ Dr. E. Rufz: "Études historiques," vol. i., p. 189.]

35 (return)
[ The brightly colored douillettes are classified by the people according to the designs of the printed calico:—robe-à-bambou,—robe-à-bouquet,—robe-arc-en-ciel, —robe-à-carreau,—etc., according as the pattern is in stripes, flower-designs, "rainbow" bands of different tints, or plaidings. Ronde-en-ronde means a stuff printed with disk-patterns, or link-patterns of different colors,—each joined with the other. A robe of one color only is called a robe-uni.

The general laws of contrasts observed in the costume require the silk foulard, or shoulder-kerchief, to make a sharp relief with the color of the robe, thus:— Robe. Foulard. Yellow Blue. Dark blue Yellow. Pink Green. Violet Bright red. Red Violet. Chocolate (cacoa) Pale blue. Sky blue Pale rose.

These refer, of course, to dominant or ground colors, as there are usually several tints in the foulard as well as the robe. The painted Madras should always be bright yellow. According to popular ideas of good dressing, the different tints of skin should be relieved by special choice of color in the robe, as follows:—

Capresse (a clear red skin) should wear.... Pale yellow. Mulatresse (according to shade).... Rose. Blue. Green. Negresse.... White. Scarlet, or any violet color.]

36 (return)
[ "Vouèla Cendrillon evec yon bel ròbe velou grande lakhè.... Ça té ka bail ou mal ziè. Li té tini bel zanneau dans zòreill li, quate-tou-chou, bouoche, bracelet, tremblant,—toutt sòte bel baggaïe conm ça."...—(Conte Cendrillon,—d'après Turiault.)

—"There was Cendrillon with a beautiful long trailing robe of velvet on her!... It was enough to hurt one's eyes to look at her! She had beautiful rings in her ears, and a collier-choux of four rows, brooches, tremblants, bracelets,—everything fine of that sort."—(Story of Cinderella in Turinault's Creole Grammar).]

37 (return)
[ It is quite possible, however, that the slaves of Dutertre's time belonged for the most part to the uglier African tribes; and that later supplies may have been procured from other parts of the slave coast. Writing half a century later, Père Labat declares having seen freshly disembarked blacks handsome enough to inspire an artist:—"J'en ai vu des deux sexes faits à peindre, et beaux par merveille" (vol. iv. chap, vii,). He adds that their skin was extremely fine, and of velvety softness;—"le velours n'est pas plus doux."... Among the 30,000 blacks yearly shipped to the French colonies, there were doubtless many representatives of the finer African races.]

38 (return)
[ "Leur sueur n'est pas fétide comme celle des nègres de la Guinée," writes the traveller Dauxion-Lavaysse, in 1813.]

39 (return)
[ Dr. E. Rufz: "Études historiques et statistiques sur la population de la Martinique." St. Pierre: 1850. Vol. i., pp. 148-50.

It has been generally imagined that the physical constitution of the black race was proof against the deadly climate of the West Indies. The truth is that the freshly imported Africans died of fever by thousands and tens-of-thousands;—the creole-negro race, now so prolific, represents only the fittest survivors in the long and terrible struggle of the slave element to adapt itself to the new environment. Thirty thousand negroes a year were long needed to supply the French colonies. Between 1700 and 1789 no less than 900,000 slaves were imported by San Domingo alone;—yet there were less than half that number left in 1789. (See Placide Justin's history of Santo Domingo, p. 147.) The entire slave population of Barbadoes had to be renewed every sixteen years, according to estimates: the loss to planters by deaths of slaves (reckoning the value of a slave at only £20 sterling) during the same period was £1,600,000 ($8,000,000). (Burck's "History of European Colonies," vol. ii., p. 141; French edition of 1767.)]

40 (return)
[ Rufz: "Études," vol. i., p. 236.]

41 (return)
[ I am assured it has now fallen to a figure not exceeding 5000.]

42 (return)
[ Rufz: "Études," vol. ii., pp. 311, 312.]

43 (return)
[ Rufz: "Études," vol. i., p. 237.]

44 (return)
[ La race de sang-mêlé, issue des blancs et des noirs, est éminement civilizable. Comme types physiques, elle fournit dans beaucoup d'individus, dans ses femmes en général, les plus beaux specimens de la race humaine.—"Le Préjugé de Race aux Antilles Françaises." Par G. Souquet-Basiège. St. Pierre, Martinique: 1883. pp. 661-62.]

45 (return)
[ Turiault: "Étude sur le langage Créole de la Martinique." Brest: 1874.... On page 136 he cites the following pretty verses in speaking of the fille-de-couleur:—

L'Amour prit soin de la former Tendre, naïve, et caressante, Faite pour plaire, encore plus pour aimer. Portant tous les traits précieux Du caractère d'une amante, Le plaisir sur sa bouche et l'amour dans ses yeux.]

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[ A sort of land-crab;—the female is selected for food, and, properly cooked, makes a delicious dish;—the male is almost worthless.]

47 (return)
[ "Voyage à la Martinique," Par J. R., Général de Brigade. Paris: An, XII., 1804. Page 106.]

48 (return)
[ According to the Martinique "Annuaire" for 1887, there were even then, out of a total population of 173,182, no less than 12,366 able to read and write.]

49 (return)
[ There is record of an attempt to manufacture bread with one part manioc flour to three of wheat flour. The result was excellent; but no serious effort was ever made to put the manioc bread on the market.]

50 (return)
[ I must mention a surreptitious dish, chatt;—needless to say the cats are not sold, but stolen. It is true that only a small class of poor people eat cats; but they eat so many cats that cats have become quite rare in St. Pierre. The custom is purely superstitious: it is alleged that if you eat cat seven times, or if you eat seven cats, no witch, wizard, or quimboiseur can ever do you any harm; and the cat ought to be eaten on Christmas Eve in order that the meal be perfectly efficacious.... The mystic number "seven", enters into another and a better creole superstition;—if you kill a serpent, seven great sins are forgiven to you: ou ké ni sept grands péchés effacé.]

51 (return)
[ Rufz remarks that the first effect of this climate of the Antilles is a sort of general physical excitement, an exaltation, a sense of unaccustomed strength,—which begets the desire of immediate action to discharge the surplus of nervous force. "Then all distances seem brief;—the greatest fatigues are braved without hesitation."— Études.]

52 (return)
[ In the patois, "yon rafale yche,"—a "whirlwind of children."]